People have obscurely sensed that Jean-Paul Sartre was occupied with a philosophy immediately involved in the peculiar confusions that have beset this general in all aspects of its culture, private as well as public. The chief effort of this work is to face the implications for personal action of a universe without purpose. That man is personally responsible for what he is and what he does; that there are no values external to man and no given human nature which he is obliged to fulfill; that man chooses his values and makes himself, and may therefore choose to be a different person - this is the heart of Jean-Paul Sartre's philosophy. - Back cover.